Talk:StarCraft: Evolution
Timeline Issues There's a bunch of timeline issues that have popped up with this novel, so I thought it best to deal with them in the one place. First, the 2508 figure, apparently moving the Into the Void campaign into this year. It was my initial inclination to treat this as an error, as it messes up the "two years later" figure in LotV, and while I get that absolute dates usually take precedence over relative ones, this is still a figure from within the game itself. It also arguably raises the question of what everyone was doing in the two year period, but that aside, Psi's made adjustments to the timeline. Psi has final say, but I feel that in this case, the timeline shouldn't be taken as writ. If the figure is repeated, maybe, but for now, use the old one. In the event of that not happening, it brings us to the second issue, as to whether we should treat Into the Void as part of the End War or not. I'm not sure if we can, because it basically has a two year fallow period followed off by a final conflict that's relatively small in scale. Every other war article we have has more or less been continuous. Third issue is what becomes the relative date for the End War. Now, I don't have the novel, and probably won't for quite some time, but from what I've seen, the figure given is six years since the end of "the war." From what I can tell, most of the time, they're referring to the End War, with the Into the Void thing being mostly classified or somesuch (which ties in with the above point about treating them as separate conflicts). As such, we can probably treat the book as occurring in 2512 for now, but this will need clarification. So, TL, DR, the main questions are: *Should the 2508 figure be treated as writ, or an error? *If treated as writ, should Into the Void be treated as part of the End War, or a separate conflict? *Is it safe to treat the book as occurring in 2512? Discuss.--Hawki (talk) 22:16, November 9, 2016 (UTC) *For 2508, that's absolutely clear. That's not a typo. The section is entitled "2508—Aftermath" and includes the sentence "Raynor also disappears sometime after the battle." This is in a separate section from 2506—War with Amon (which is clearly describing Legacy of the Void). *For Into the Void, IMO that should be a separate conflict. *Unfortunately 2512 isn't 100% confirmed (for some reason, neither the novel itself nor Nova: Covert Ops are in the timeline). The year isn't directly mentioned. It appears to take place in that year. Six years after the end of the war (meaning the End War), much like two years after for Raynor's disappearance... and the Dominion anniversary that appears in Raynor's final cinematic is referenced. A line says that "Today is the sixth anniversary of the end of the war, or at least his part of it." I'm 99% sure that it's 2512 and not 2514. It's on page 4, which is how we were able to see that before. PSH aka Kimera 757 (talk) 00:22, November 10, 2016 (UTC) ::Alrighty, just finished the novel, so thoughts. ::*I agree, 2508 seems fairly clear in the novels. I expect that the "two years later" may have just been from 2506, as wonky as that is. That seems to not be a typo, especially since they have a section for 2506. ::*I also agree Into the Void is its own conflict. I may just retrofit the battle article into a conflict article. We also have a few other names for the End War now, the Amon incident seems to be the primary one. Also unrelated, they seem to have named the conflict in this novel the One-Day War ::*Considering "his part of it," I'm comfortable with 2512. It borders on speculation but he very obviously didn't take part in the Void Expedition. Still no year on NCO which is going to throw a giant wrench into how we order things... I can't even think of how to order them, since the book never implies the Dominion have gone through a crisis like the DoM but the book's ending raises a ton of questions should the book conflict happen before NCO. Thoughts? ::*Jesus Mary and Joseph we've got our work cut out for us with this book. Subsourian (talk) 02:27, November 10, 2016 (UTC) :::Well, you guys are in a better position than me in regards to judgement, but right now, it seems to be fair to place NCO before Evolution. We only have Waugh's statement on that, but it's the only definitive piece of info we have right now. "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence," so to speak.--Hawki (talk) 03:26, November 10, 2016 (UTC) :::Also, kind of off-topic, but what's your take on the novel's quality? Barring spoilers, have the zerg become space hippies? :(--Hawki (talk) 03:29, November 10, 2016 (UTC) ::::It's very well written and I like the characters a lot, even the ones that normally get thrown in as mooks. Very strictly adheres to canon too which is nice, but still manages to be approachable. Overall probably in my top three in terms of SC books, but I need some time to process it. The interpretation of the zerg is... interesting. I wouldn't call it bad but I don't know how I feel about it quite yet and I can't go into detail without spoilers. You'll have to see for yourself. The novel was much different than I expected but in a good way. ::::I will say though, and it's tangentially related but I've only noticed in this book, I've lost a lot of interest in the Dominion since they've gone from the tyranny the terrans had to live with to the "good guys." They're presented well here, but Valerian being a peaceful despot fails to engage the same way as Arcturus's unpredictable nature. ::::Speaking of spoilers, do we want to wait a bit before I start updating the wiki with content? Normally I'd jump in if this was a mission pack or something but I wasn't sure if we gave books a bit of a grace period.Subsourian (talk) 04:27, November 10, 2016 (UTC) :::::There isn't really a set waiting period after a product's released. Go for it.--Hawki (talk) 05:16, November 10, 2016 (UTC) ::::::I'm somewhat divided on the matter for the book. It seems to me that Zagara had changed way more than any of us had expected. On a more cynical interpretation, it seemed that Kerrigan was forced to realize all she ever knew was in the form of destruction, so she simply dumped the burden of rebuilding on Zagara's shoulders instead. That having been said, the book really did seem to portray Zagara as regretful of the destruction done by the swarm, but Artanis simply wasn't having any of it. On the Dominion side, the initial start of the book showed Valerian is still struggling to put the Dominion together as there's still too many people insistent that he's just a cheap copy of his father, he just can't afford to show that because the Dominion is still in a dilapidated state. Made the edits in the article, but it's been confirmed that the novel takes place after NCO. So, there's that. Just need absolute dates now. :(--Hawki (talk) 23:21, November 10, 2016 (UTC)